Industrial Symbiosis in Alberta’s Construction Industry скачать в хорошем качестве

Industrial Symbiosis in Alberta’s Construction Industry

A common view amongst the scientific community is that the planet has shifted from the human sustaining Holocene period to a new geological epoch known as the Anthropocene. A framework called the planetary boundary model has outlined nine environmental variables important to the maintenance of a viable Anthropocene. These variables have been highlighted to provide limits for a safe operating space on the planet. Waste disposal to landfills is a human activity that plays a substantial role in increasing the risk of exceedance of these boundaries, specifically in terms of its influence on climate change and changes in land use. Canada is the largest producer of waste per capita on the planet. Within Canada, Alberta is consistently the biggest culprit for this waste generation, approximately 30% of which comes from construction activities. As the fourth largest construction company in Canada, Graham Construction has a significant opportunity to reduce its carbon and resource footprints by employing waste diversion techniques. One such approach to waste diversion, is the linking of waste outputs from construction activities to the material inputs of another firm, creating a collaborative partnership in which materials that would otherwise be disposed of can be upcycled or reused by other industries. This process, called Industrial Symbiosis (IS), is a subset within the broader subject area known as the circular economy. Employing the principles of Industrial Ecology, this paper first, examines the material metabolism of two historical projects undertaken by Graham Construction in Alberta. Cardboard, concrete, aggregate, drywall, metal, and wood are identified as the greatest material contributors to waste generation within the company. A literature review to discover potential output-to-input material sharing opportunities is then conducted, with emphasis placed on upcycling these material outputs to retain most of their value. A list of existing companies in Alberta that show the potential to engage in IS partnerships is then generated. These companies and their locations are subsequently logged in Microsoft Excel where a tool for optimizing opportunities for material sharing is created. The tool considers the type of material output and the travel distance required for upcycling to take place. The overall purpose of this study was to initiate the integration of Graham into a network of firms with less dependency on geological mining of primary resources, decreased greenhouse gas emissions, decreased material supply and waste disposal costs, and reduced output to landfills, ultimately relieving some of the impacts that the construction industry in Alberta has on exceedance of the safe operating limits outlined in the planetary boundary model.